The present invention relates generally to menstrual cycle indicators, and more particularly, to digital wristwatches for monitoring women""s menstrual, ovulation, and menopausal cycles.
It is well known in the art that a woman""s menstrual cycle occurs approximately once a month. For obvious reasons, women monitor the number of days that have passed since their last menstrual cycle or so-called xe2x80x9cmenses.xe2x80x9d Indeed, most women, if not all, mark off a fixed number of days from their last menstrual cycle on a calendar to determine when their next period is due. While this method is simple and inexpensive, it also has a number of drawbacks. First, a woman must remember the date of her last menstrual cycle. Second, if a woman incorrectly counts the number of days from her last cycle, she will also make a mistake when her next menstrual cycle or period is due. Third, women who monitor their ovulation, such as for birth control or fertility, can likewise incorrectly count the number of days, and thereby erroneously time the period during which to abstain from or engage in sexual intercourse. Similarly, using this latter method, women can also make a mistake about when to expect pre-menstrual syndrome (PMS), which occurs several days before and after a woman""s period.
In the prior art, various attempts have been made for monitoring a woman""s menstrual cycle. Most notably, U.S. Pat. No. 4,527,906 to Jezbera discloses a digital watch module that displays the number of days that have passed since the start of a woman""s last menstrual cycle. One primary drawback of the foregoing prior art, however, is its inability, among other things, to display information relating to a woman""s menstrual cycle in a manner that is readily useful to a woman. For example, from the displayed information of Jezbera, a woman must still use, for example, a calendar to determine the dates of her last and next menstrual cycles, as well as the dates of her ovulation and pre-menstrual syndrome.
Another drawback in the prior art is its inability to automatically monitor for variations in a woman""s cycle. This is especially important inasmuch as women""s cycles vary by an average of about seven to thirteen days for peak reproductive years and by even a greater amount for girls in their teens and women approaching menopause.
An object of the present invention, therefore, is to provide an electronic device or chronometer for use by women of various ages to monitor their menstrual, ovulation and menopausal cycles. More specifically, an object of the present invention is to display information relating to a woman""s menstrual cycle that is readily useful to the woman, including the dates of the last and next menstrual cycles, the number of days that have elapsed since the last menstrual cycle, and date of the next ovulation. If desired, the day(s) a woman expects PMS can also be displayed, such as for those who severely experience the associated symptoms.
A further object of the invention is to automatically monitor for variations in the woman""s menstrual cycle, compared to, for example, the actual number of days in her menstrual cycles from previous months.
A further object of the present invention is to provide such a display in conjunction with the current time, day, month and year as well as in conjunction with the display of a standard calendar.
A further object of the present invention is to provide alarms to the woman, programmable one to several days before the start of the menstrual cycle, so as to alert the woman that she is within a target range, either relating to ovulation or pre-menstrual syndrome.
These and other objects of the present invention are achieved by arranging display windows on the face of a digital wristwatch which windows are programmable to display the date of the last menstrual cycle, the date of the next menstrual cycle, the number of days since the last menstrual cycle and the date of ovulation.
In a preferred embodiment, the present invention is a microprocessor-based watch responsive to inputs from a user, including the date of her last menstrual cycle and the number of days in the woman""s menstrual cycle. In response to such inputs, the microprocessor automatically calculates or estimates the woman""s ovulation day and the date of her next menstrual cycle for the purpose of displaying such information to the woman.
Also, the preferred embodiment of the invention includes a look-up table or memory which stores information about a woman""s previous menstrual cycles which may be used in determining the date of the woman""s next menstrual cycle or ovulation day. Also, such prior menstrual history may be used to account or monitor for variations in a woman""s menstrual cycle. Furthermore, such information may be retrieved and used for medical diagnostics, if the woman later becomes ill.
In the preferred embodiment, an annular portion of the display may be segmented into equally spaced divisions and used to visually indicate the number of days that have passed since the last menstrual cycle began.